Ethan's Mission to Nicaragua

  Date: Mon, Dec 30, 2013 at 4:03 PM Subject: Happy New Year! To: Jim And Sandy Bever < jsbever@molalla.net > Here´s some pictures of my week after SKYPEing you all. It was really nice to be able to talk to you and perhaps they were the shortest 40 minutes of my mission. Thank you as well for the letters you all wrote and I enjoyed reading them very much, in fact I´ve read them 3 times through. The photo you sent also was very nice and Sister Russell put it in a powerpoint with music and showed it on Friday in our Multizona. I´ve always thought that I have a pretty attractive family, we just need a funny, handsome, tan guy in there somewhere. After SKYPEing, Elder Tadiello talked with his family later that night and his family was very happy to see him and very sad to have to say goodbye. We later had a district from another town about an hour away come and stay the night in our house on the 26th so that at 4:30 the next day we could leave to go to Managua. The bus ha...

  Don´t worry about last week, I just thought that if someone happened to be on the internet that they could send the other email, but today I got to read two. Sounds like we´re all ready for Christmas this year and I´m excited to talk to you on SKYPE in just two days. I´m glad that Thomas did so well with his classes this term, there is no better feeling than finishing something knowing that is was done well and being able to relax for a little while (as far as the relaxing part goes, I haven´t done much of that on my mission but doing things well I´ve done a couple of times). As far as talking with you on Wednesday, we went to the church building this morning here in Juigalpa and it has a bunch of stuff to use to SKYPE home, but they´ve been having problems with the internet for the last couple of days so we´re sill having to coordinate things a little on our end. As of right now, I´m still hoping to be able to get on at the same time at 1:00pm my time but I´m just not quite ...

  Hi Family!  This last Wednesday I had changes! I am now serving in a city called Juigalpa. After 7 months in San Marcos it made it hard to have to say goodbye, but after a 3 hour bus ride out to Juigalpa, I realize that there are a lot of things ahead of me as well. Here´s a couple of pictures from the day that I had to say goodbye to everyone there. (Don´t worry, I´ll be sure to get Elder Velásquez´ things to him for Christmas). Still haven´t received packages, but they´ll get here eventually. My new companion´s name is Elder Tadiello. He´s from Brazil and he and I came into the mission at the same time. He´s really great and I think we´re going to do well in Juigalpa (you should google it). I´ll send you a picture of him and my area next week I hope.  Something that everyone in the mission knows about and looks forward to is that in the zone where I now am, there´s an area called Bluefields (you can google that place too). As part of my responsibilities here now...

  Its nice to hear from you all and I know that I always start like that in my letters but it really is. Elder Velásquez is feeling much better and he will be very grateful for the things that you are sending him. He left the hospital on Tuesday and is now as healthy as can be. Thank you for all you do for him and I. I have been thinking a lot about family lately and the importance that families have for each of us and I am very grateful for the blessing that my family is for me. I don´t think that very many people are as lucky as I am. I think something that I have learned while I´ve been on my mission is how to love others and recognize that I love them. Maybe its a little sentimental, but I realize much better now how much I appreciate others and what I can do for them. Tell the missionaries in the ward there that I said hi and that I´m praying for them. Sorry I don´t have more time but I hope you all have a wonderful week and that you know you much you are loved. Love, ...

  Thanks for the photos, its so nice to see you all again. Even better it will be to see you all in person in just a few days! This last week made me really grateful to be healthy. Elder Velásquez recovered from his eye problems to have kidney problems afterward. We took it one day at a time during the week but it made it hard to get out and work. Today we took him to the hospital in the morning and he`ll be there for a couple of days. I`m now back in San Marcos with Elder Levy again! You remember the one who was with me last change? He`s on temporary divisions with me here until my real companion feels better... poor guy. Anyway, we did have a funny experience yesterday though with Elder Velásquez. We had heard that the First Presidency Christmas Devotional was going to be yesterday so anxiously we made plans to invite lots of investigators to the church building to watch it with us. We were both really excited to see it and get into the christmasy spirit. After inviting the f...

  Date: November 25, 2013 at 1:37:41 PM PST To: Jim And Sandy Bever < jsbever@molalla.net > Subject: Happy Thanksgiving! So turkey here is pretty hard to come by so we´ll see if I´ll end up eating some or not this week, they say its more common to eat around Christmas here. This last week went by pretty fast and even though it was full of ups and downs, I learned a lot. We´re working with a really positive family right now and they were references from another young member family in the ward. The wife was going to get married and baptized on Saturday but after doing everything possible on our part we had to let them exercise their faith to take the last step and just do it. Its frusturating when sometimes people don´t choose what will really make them happy in the end, but we´re not going to be giving up anytime soon. We´re also working with another family that have similar circumstances as the first but there´s a funny story that goes with them. The wife´s name is Car...

  Date: November 11, 2013 at 1:42:42 PM PST To: Jim And Sandy Bever < jsbever@molalla.net > Subject: ... I´m fine, how about you? This week went by pretty quickly. Here´s some things that are going on right now for me: the rain is starting to calm down a little but until January it gets a little cooler so that´s nice, I realized that gas prices here are the most expensive in all of north and south america so its nice to not have to drive, transfers are Wednesday so we´ll see if I stay or go but I feel like I´ll be here for a little while longer (this next change is only 4 weeks long so that the missionaries that are leaving can go home before Christmas), and I got your package! Thanks for the shirts and candy. I listened to the CD the first chance I got (I even robbed a CD player from the sisters here so that I could listen to it). Elder Velásquez thinks I´m a dork every time I press the button on the stuffed animal thing, but I like it. Oh and thinking about Chris...